The Naked Obama Supporter

We swear we did not know he was black. We swear we thought he was completely naked. We figured almost immediately he was an Obama supporter.

Here’s what happened: we saw a small headline story on DrudgeReport about “…a shirtless man wielding a 35-inch-long samurai sword”. The man was “marching” along Interstate 65 in Indiana without a shirt on (that must have triggered those vile “naked” thoughts in our naughty minds) “like a drum major, holding the sword, moving it up and down in rhythm with his marching cadence.”

We figured almost immediately the marching sword guy was an Obama supporter because:

“At the Lake County, Ind. jail, the offender announced he was “Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs,” state police said.”

Cuckoo! Cuckoo! That to us was proof positive of an Obama supporter. Only later did we discover the Cuckoo guy is black (there was a picture of him in another linked story). Considering the large percentage of black voters that voted for Obama (or supported but did not vote) our guess is statistically sound. But we could be wrong.

The “cuckoo” guy might have been one of many Hillary Clinton supporters or for that matter a John McCain supporter – driven into cuckoo land by President Zero’s maddening boobery.

“Via Breitbart TV, this is Labor Day the way it should be — with a guy named Hoffa threatening his political enemies while a union-stooge Democratic leader sits by and smiles. Honestly, I can’t decide how seriously to take him. On the one hand, this sort of salty tough-guy “we don’t take sh*t from no one” garbage is par for the course for labor leaders when addressing the rank and file, and all the more so when it’s the head of the Teamsters speaking. Sure, he makes $300,000 a year on the backs of his working-class constituents, but he knows conservatives are sons of bitches so his “authenticity” is secure. Plus he’s a Hoffa; this sort of rhetoric may be congenital. On the other hand, so filthy was the the left’s demagoguery of the right’s “tone” after the Giffords shooting that this sort of verbal excess by one of their own will never, ever be allowed to pass again without their faces being ground in it. So here you go. Start grinding, please.

A Twitter pal argued that this could have been a “Sistah Souljah moment” for Obama if he had challenged Hoffa on what he said. Interesting point, but I think O had other priorities today — like, for instance, noting how “proud” he is of Hoffa and other union leaders.”

We sorta like union tough guys who swagger but we thought it was the new golden age and this was not supposed to happen. So never mind all that. It’s not a surprise that Obama hangs with thugs – didn’t we write that sometime in 2007? Scratch a top Obama supporter, find a thug.

What is more interesting is the Big Media reaction. Joe Scarborough had this to say early today:

“Host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Joe Scarborough repeatedly asked why the media is ignoring Jimmy Hoffa’s violent rhetoric at an event yesterday where President Obama was also a speaker.

“Seriously, we talk, we criticize Republicans all the time when they come out, Michele Bachmann says horrible things or Sarah Palin has targets and all the press joins in and it’s a big old party, but you have the head of the Teamsters introducing the President of the United States and he talks about quote ‘taking them out.’ Silence. Not a word. And you know, every media outlet — actually Jake Tapper, [of] ABC News did something on it, but nobody else,” Scarborough said.

Toward the end of the clip New York Magazine’s John Heilemann said the President should “call out” Jimmy Hoffa.”

Joe Scarborough is wondering where Big Media is and why the story is being covered up. That’s true but apologist. What Joe Scarborough should be denouncing is that Barack Obama said nothing the moment Hoffa finished the Obama introduction.

It won’t be good enough if eventually Obama has released a statement about civility or something. The question is why didn’t Obama say something at the moment. Wasn’t Obama the guy who puffed his chest and said he would tell unpleasant truths to people? So why didn’t Obama say something when it mattered?

Why didn’t Obama denounce Hoffa’s remarks at the time in mattered and in front of the people who heard the threats? Years ago Bill Clinton had his famous Sista Soulja confrontation in which he denounced her remarks “If black people kill black people every day, why not have a week and kill white people?”

Sista Soulja made her ugly remarks one day before Bill Clinton spoke at Jesse Jackson’s political group and Bill Clinton did what he needed to do. Bill Clinton was denounced by race-baiters of course.

and then we found Obama flew all his union President buddies up to that awful speech on AF1 at taxpayers expense.
Do they have some kind of porta-waterboarder on AF1?

remember how Trumka was talking about distancing the AFL-CIO the Dems?

Well, just like Kucinich who used to be againts Obamacare until he was taken for an AF1 ride, it looks like Trumka has Trumka got the same treatment.
Some labor leaders have been critical of Obama, including AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, who recently demanded that the president be bolder in his job proposals even in the face of GOP opposition.
Trumka, along with Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, flew to Detroit with Obama on Air Force One. Speaking to the crowd before Obama took the stage, Trumka had praise for the president.
“He’s the man who worked with autoworkers to save America’s auto industry,” Trumka said. “That’s the kind of bold, courageous action we need right now.”http://tucsoncitizen.com/arizona-news/2011/09/06/obama-calls-on-gop-foes-to-help-him-create-jobs/

Well its Sept and I am hoping beyond hope that he throws in the towel and lets Hillary run…or maybe they have a better plan….I sure hope so!

I am in no way, no shape, no form going to vote for Rick Perry….anyone who would have “forced sonograms on pregnant women” wanting an abortion is not anyone I’d vote for EVER! He’s slick, and lots of folks a still gullible…that’s what I see!

Why would we want another cowboy for Texas….we’ve had 2 and both were bad, although LBJ at least helped out a few…while killing thousands of my generation.

I have no doubt that some of the vicious language directed at the Tea party/ GOP is coming directly from the White House. The President that pleaded for civility after the Giffords tragedy certainly has not lead by example….but then again, has he ever “lead” on anything?

“We got to keep an eye on the battle that we face: The war on workers. And you see it everywhere, it is the Tea Party. And you know, there is only one way to beat and win that war. The one thing about working people is we like a good fight. And you know what? They’ve got a war, they got a war with us and there’s only going to be one winner. It’s going to be the workers of Michigan, and America. We’re going to win that war,” Hoffa told thousands of workers gathered for the annual Labor Day rally.
“President Obama, this is your army. We are ready to march… Everybody here’s got a vote…Let’s take these sons of bitches out and give America back to an America where we belong,” he concluded.

There are links to more details on the story at

mediamatters.org/blog/201109050003

I remember Angle getting the same kind of treatment for saying something about ‘taking out’ Reid.

Every single day some one is coming to beg her! LOL! Rise Hillary!
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Hillary already HAS an army, an army that did not switch candidates, shut up and sit down.
Glad this obot has finally seen the light, but buyers remorse should make him more humble in his demands to the WOMAN that DID WIN and was stabbed in the back by these folks that did not care about experience, hard work and real ethics. Half tone skin was more important to them than picking the best, female candidate.

Seriously, the Hoffa thing is just BS, just as the idea that “violent rhetoric” was responsible for Gabby Gifford being shot. The thing about it is the Big Media blatant hypocracy with regard to the double standard.

OK, so he’s pro-Hillary now. But his fears of Bachmann and Palin are unfounded. Neither one of them scares me, I’d pull the lever for either one if they’re up against Waffles. For that matter, Romney too.

I have a friend who’s child works at a green business across the street from the solar panels in Fremont, CA. Those people arrived to work and were locked out. The other company is must smaller, but they will try to save a few of the people, as they have openings.

I just can’t bring myself to vote for Perry…if he runs…I’ll just not vote….because I truly can’t vote for Odumbo either…and yes I could vote for Palin or Romney…I get a quisy feeling over Bachmann, but would listen to more from her before deciding….

“I can make a firm pledge. Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes,”
President Obama, September 12, 2008

Beginning January 1, 2013, ObamaCare imposes a 3.8% Medicare tax on unearned income of “high-income” taxpayers which could apply to proceeds from the sale of single family homes, townhouses, co-ops, condominiums, and even rental income, depending on your individual circumstances and any capital gains tax exclusions. Importantly, the “high income” thresholds are not indexed for inflation so will reach increasing numbers of middle-class taxpayers over time.

In February 2010, 5.02 million homes were sold, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR). On any given day, the sale of a house, townhome, condominium, co-op, or income from a rental property could slam middle-income families with a new tax they can’t afford.

This new ObamaCare tax is the first time the government will apply a 3.8 percent tax on unearned income. This new tax on home sales and unearned income and other Medicare taxes raise taxes more than $210 billion to pay for ObamaCare. The National Association of Realtors called this new Medicare tax on unearned income “destructive” and “ill-advised” and warned it would hurt job creation.

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btw…did you see the Richard Cohen piece…according to Cohen O – the big Zere – has lost the Hamptons…

Beginning January 1, 2013, ObamaCare imposes a 3.8% Medicare tax on unearned income of “high-income” taxpayers which could apply to proceeds from the sale of single family homes, townhouses, co-ops, condominiums, and even rental income, depending on your individual circumstances and any capital gains tax exclusions. Importantly, the “high income” thresholds are not indexed for inflation so will reach increasing numbers of middle-class taxpayers over time.

In February 2010, 5.02 million homes were sold, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR). On any given day, the sale of a house, townhome, condominium, co-op, or income from a rental property could slam middle-income families with a new tax they can’t afford.

This new ObamaCare tax is the first time the government will apply a 3.8 percent tax on unearned income. This new tax on home sales and unearned income and other Medicare taxes raise taxes more than $210 billion to pay for ObamaCare. The National Association of Realtors called this new Medicare tax on unearned income “destructive” and “ill-advised” and warned it would hurt job creation.

That sentence is a fat target for ridicule, I know, since the Hamptons are often reviled as the playground of the ridiculously rich and the promiscuously silly — hardly the working-class Democratic base. As is usually the case, there’s some truth to the stereotype, but enough exceptions to that rule to make the White House pay attention. The Hamptons is where the Democratic energy, money and intellectual firepower of Manhattan goes for R&R. It’s just not another beach.

Over the Labor Day weekend, I went to a number of events in the Hamptons. At all of them, Obama was discussed. At none of them — that’s none — was he defended. That was remarkable. After all, sitting around various lunch and dinner tables were mostly Democrats. Not only that, some of them had been vociferous Obama supporters, giving time and money to his election effort. They were all disillusioned.

Let me call the roll. I am talking about are writers and editors, lawyers and shrinks, Wall Street tycoons and freelance photographers, hedge funders and academics, run-of-the-mill Democrats and Democratic activists. They were all politically sophisticated, and just a year ago some of them were still vociferous Obama supporters. No more.

Frankly, I was surprised. The Hamptons are a redoubt of New York liberalism. It is to campaign money what the Outer Banks are to fishermen. I expected more than a few people to defend the president. No one did. Everyone — and I do mean everyone — expressed disappointment in him as a leader. In that area, they thought he was a bust. Some articulated detailed critiques — the nature of his stimulus program, for instance. They argued that more money should have gone into long-term infrastructure programs. Most, though, skipped the details and just registered dismay: Where had their “change” agent gone?

In general, Obama was faulted for lacking political skills. I have long held this view, citing just recently his refusal to take advantage of the Republican leadership’s desire to nickel-and-dime disaster aid and instead give them the gift of scheduling his jobs speech on the night of the GOP debate. Obama held out for an hour or two and then ordered a retreat — an epochal moment in weakness, confusion and brain-dead politics. From his grave, Lyndon Johnson wept.

I grant you that the Hamptons are not America, and I grant you further that some of these people will scurry back to the Democratic fold when they have to choose between Obama and, say, Rick Perry. (Jon Huntsman or Mitt Romney is a different matter.) In the meantime, though, these opinion leaders, these political activists, these people with influence and, yes, money, have bailed on Obama — not just some of them, not just a few of them, but all of them. The early returns are in: Obama has lost the Hamptons.

more and more dems are waking up to the fact that O is running as a repub…

they are sick of him…today i spoke with a very intelligent writer/filmmaker, he was an O supporter…now he is another one who easily admits that he was fooled by O…so I said…’but you see the writing on the wall now right’ his answer ‘absolutely, O is more like a republican’

“[ Union bosses are ] chasing American industry offshore by making outrageous, economically illogical demands that they know will never work. And now that they’ve chased jobs out of union states, they’re trying to chase them out of right-to-work states like South Carolina, so eventually the jobs will leave America altogether.”

WASHINGTON — US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke Tuesday with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas ahead of a showdown over the Palestinians’ controversial bid for UN membership, the State Department said.

The Palestinians are expected to make their bid later this month before the United Nations General Assembly — a move Washington opposes. The US is seeking to set up a new round of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians.

Clinton urged Abbas “to work hard with us to avoid a negative scenario in New York at the end of the month,” State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.

Abbas will Wednesday meet with US Middle East envoy David Hale, and Clinton called on the Palestinian leadership to “hear him with open ears” as Washington hopes to avert a potentially rancorous UN meeting.

White House spokesman Jay Carney meanwhile said the Palestinian effort was “not productive or helpful,” telling reporters that peace needed to be “negotiated directly by both parties.”

Making the UN membership bid without a peace plan in place would “not bring the Palestinians any closer to statehood,” he said.

Washington is said to be seeking to draft a proposal for peace talks that will be acceptable to Israel, as well as Russia, the European Union and the UN — the other members of the international peacemaking Quartet.

“We are going to continue to work right up until the UN General Assembly, if necessary, to get these parties back to the table, and we’ll continue to work afterwards,” Nuland said of US efforts.

US diplomatic efforts are focused on including a number of countries in the region to help deter the Palestinians’ move toward seeking unilateral statehood.

“We have been talking in diplomatic channels… to a much broader section of countries than we usually talk to about Middle East peace, because many of them who don’t usually get confronted with decisions like this could be confronted with a decision in the General Assembly,” she said.

Direct talks between Israel and Palestinians came to a halt shortly after they were relaunched in Washington last September over the issue of settlement construction.

The Palestinians refuse to resume talks while Israel builds in annexed Arab east Jerusalem and the rest of the occupied West Bank.

When President Obama delivers his address on a new job-creation plan to a joint session of Congress on Thursday, he won’t be speaking to a sold-out crowd. Several lawmakers are still determining whether it is worth their time to stay in Washington to hear the president, and some are already planning to skip it.

When President Obama delivers his address on a new job-creation plan to a joint session of Congress on Thursday, he won’t be speaking to a sold-out crowd. Several lawmakers are still determining whether it is worth their time to stay in Washington to hear the president, and some are already planning to skip it.

—————

The voters don’t wanna watch him either.

What if he gave a prime time speech and nobody came.

Left over from my days as a young pup, “What if they had a war and nobody came”…was that saying by John Lennon?

Admin, the gov called a special session on reapportionment. However, it has turned out to be a big fight on her sideways attempt to stop illegals from getting drivers license. She tried to get something passed in the regular session, but failed. She asked that department to check to do a stat sample to see if the people are at the address submitted or the license, and found that a lot were not.

However, up in Santa Fe there are a lot of protestors on both sides. I still think she will not get legislation through, as she lacks the majority. I cannot tell if the issue is helping or hurting her. However, most of the protestors are hispanic. I wonder if she ran for national office the hispanic vote would split over her because of this issue, and other similar.

There is usually only one session in NM which starts around mid Jan, and finishes end of Feb. This is a special session out of cycle I cannot help but think that some voted for her because of her heritage thinking she would not pursue this so aggressively Now that she has, it might be hurting her. I will keep you informed

If anyone has a suggestion about unions I’d love to hear it.
I am very conflicted. I have a small business that provides hospitality workers. I’m the guy that temp agencies go to when they are desperate for help. I charge more as it usually day of scenarios but I also provide my workers with transportation, uniforms and kid care. Almost impossible to get a decent banquet server for a four hour gig when they are going to have to spend three hours commuting and pay a baby sitter. If they are paid 50 for the job they might have netted 20 after taxes and they most likely had to take two buses and wait well over an hour. Not worth it.
Sometimes the jobs we get require us to deal with union workers. I own my little business but I find it frightening how the union caterers act. not my job. Screw them. On and on. Sorry the hospitality industry can suck and be demeaning, but you took a job. No one made you. i have a zero tolerance for rudeness to anyone who works for me and when someone employs one of my workers i make that very clear. Never have an issue with universities, huge conglomerates, law firms. But almost every time we do a job that is union I get workers bombarding me with complaints and telling me they will never do that job again.

Thats the thing henry, when its unionised, quite often the quality decreases and problems increase because they can get away with doing the dirt minimum and they can complain to high hell about the slightest thing, it really hampers work ethic and time. I could never stand those jumped up little hitler union supervisors who stick their noses into anything.

TONY EASTLEY: To the US, and some people calling it the unofficial start of the 2012 election campaign – and in a way it is, at least for Barack Obama.

The President will be running for re-election in November next year but the Republicans are still to decide who to pit against him. That doesn’t mean Mr Obama is taking things easy.

Correspondent Jane Cowan reports.

(Aretha Franklin singing ‘Respect’)

JANE COWAN: If there was any doubt about the stakes, the Obama camp is pulling out the big guns.

Aretha Franklin, who sang at the President’s inauguration, did her best to help him recapture the magic at a union rally in Detroit.

ARETHA FRANKLIN: Who do I respect? The brother that I’m talking about with that fine, fine walk and that stroll, he sits in the Oval Office – Okay?

JANE COWAN: In the wake of a dismal jobs report which showed no job growth in the month of August, the President’s appearance in a place where the auto industry, at least, is rebounding was seen as a preview of the big jobs speech he’ll make before a joint sitting of Congress later this week.

BARACK OBAMA: I’m not satisfied just to get back to where we were before the recession. We’ve got to fully restore the middle class in America.

(Cheers)

JANE COWAN: Here, at least, Barack Obama was among friends.

(Audience chanting)

CHANT: Four more years. Four more years.

JANE COWAN: A Tea Party rally in New Hampshire was swinging to a different beat.

SONG: I need a bailout, won’t you help me, won’t you …

JANE COWAN: The keynote speaker, Sarah Palin, picked up old themes, painting Barack Obama as an ‘unvetted’ candidate who’s become a failed president.

SARAH PALIN: Obama’s hope has changed us from a country of hope to one of anxiety. What exactly is Barack Obama’s plan?

JANE COWAN: She was interrupted several times by the crowd urging her to run for president.

(Crowd chant)

CHANT: Run, Sarah, run.

SARAH PALIN: I appreciate your encouragement, I do.

JANE COWAN: In South Carolina, the Texas Governor and new Republican front runner, Rick Perry, was busy displaying his conservative Christian credentials.

RICK PERRY: And my wife said “On Sunday morning you won’t see my husband playing golf, he’ll be at church.”

(Applause)

JANE COWAN: And carving out a niche for himself as the anti-Obama.

RICK PERRY: We cannot choose a nominee that is going to blur the lines between this President and our nominee.

It has to be someone who has a very stark difference. And I would suggest to you I’m that person.

(Applause)

JANE COWAN: His audience lapped it up.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Clearly you are a different kind of Texan. We had Lyndon Johnson and two Bushes and we don’t need no more of them – we need you!

JANE COWAN: Just what Barack Obama can do to get his political mojo back is unclear.

DAVID GERGEN: I’m not sure anybody knows at this point. I’m particularly clear that his own White House doesn’t know.

JANE COWAN: David Gergen has advised four US presidents, including Reagan and Clinton.

He says Obama often makes the right decisions but the way he exercises power, by making pre-emptive concessions to his opponents, has him looking weak.

DAVID GERGEN: I must tell you now there are people in the Democratic Party who wonder whether there’s any possibility of him stepping aside in favour of Hillary Clinton.

JANE COWAN: Times might be tough but Barack Obama is going to need to be tougher.

henry: frightening how the union caterers act. not my job.
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I’ve no solution for you henry, but can attest to the incredibly nasty culture which has grown up around unions. I learned about unions in a hurry, At the time a new-hire, the first job I was assigned was already 30 days behind schedule. Drawings from drafting (union area of company) took forever. On the day they arrived in the comapany mail, our secretary (union) was not at work. I just took them to move the process along. I was naive and motivated by common sense. I was informed of the line I’d crossed, and put the drawings back with the rest of the mail.

Early morning TV crawl – and a ‘good on’ former NY Governor David Paterson: he’s going to be a radio host! Maybe he’ll get around to broadcasting what Obama did to him.

holdem, thats the thing, they believe if that person is not there and the job needs to be done, no one else must do the job as they say its taking someones job away when really it means that job is probably unecessary. Thats the thing with unions, it takes 60 people and makes them do the job of 30 people, that pushes costs up, keeps wages low and in recessions busts companies.

Now and then, I send a little money to Americans For Prosperity, and I receive the emails of its Pennsylvania branch. For Big Pink readers in NE Penna so inclined, there is a rally Saturday in observance of Constitution Day. Details:
Join Americans for Prosperity’s Jennifer Stefano on Saturday, September 17th from 4:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at the Lackawanna County Courthouse Square in Scranton to kick off Constitution week in grand fashion! Don’t miss this fun-filled day celebrating our nation’s freedom with food, music, and exciting educational opportunities. Hear a review of the Founding Principles and how they were embodied in the Constitution. Likewise, learn why the Constitution is as relevant today as it was in 1787. Listen to the history of how political leaders have circumvented the Constitution and continue to do so today. Also, listen to leaders’ perspectives on what action needs to be taken.

It was on September 17, 1787 that American patriots signed the United States Constitution and changed the course of history. This event will celebrate the achievements of our Founding Fathers, centering on individual liberty.

In the Wednesday Morning Jolt, a look at the possibility of keeping one’s shoes on in future airport security lines, the Democrats’ sudden aversion to the word “stimulus,” and then…

Nobody Ever Blames the Maryland and Virginia Suburbs

Boy, Obama and his surrogates just can’t stop blaming the presidents who came before him. First they spent years blaming George W. Bush, now they’re blaming George Washington.

Oh, wait, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney meant the other Washington. The one where Obama has lived and (technically) worked since January 2005 and where he is the single-most powerful and influential lawmaker: “White House officials said Tuesday that President Obama’s approval ratings are dropping because Americans are furious with Washington in general… Obama’s high-30s approval ratings, Carney said, are a reflection of ‘a high reservoir of skepticism toward Washington in general.’ ‘I think that everybody associated with Washington is being viewed quite dimly right now,’ Carney said. To that end, Carney continued the White House assault on House Republicans, whom Obama and his allies are blaming for gridlock that ‘wasn’t just frustrating; it was harmful.’ ‘For no other reason than ideological purity, Washington almost brought the global economy to its knees this summer,’ Carney said.”

Oh, sure, there’s a kernel of truth to this interpretation, but it still relies on the notion that voters can’t distinguish between the parties, much less the particular top figures in our political system. (It’s like blaming out-of-wedlock births on New England Patriots quarterbacks.) In the Carney theory, the voters are merely confused between which one is Obama and which one is John Boehner, and if they somehow had a clearer scorecard of what the two men stood for, Obama’s approval rating would be a healthy majority. Carney more or less dismisses the possibility that Obama’s earned that 30something percent approval rating, or that Obama’s done anything significantly wrong as president. Maybe that’s the psychological price of the job, that you can’t open the door to self-doubt or fears that you’ve already made significant policymaking mistakes. And yet, running around believing that all of other’s disappointments, frustrations, or grievances with you are their fault for not understanding how great you are doesn’t seem like a formula for greater success.

I have to clean up the assessment from Jonn Lilyea at This Ain’t Hell, but I think you’ll get the gist: “Hey! [Bad word]! You ARE Washington. From where were you speaking? The dead [another bad-word-ing] center of Washington…at the best-known address in Washington. If the President isn’t Washington, what the [that second bad word again] is he? Who was the [that first bad word again] who early in his presidency defended his impending agenda with the snarky “I won”? Own it all.”

Doug Winship urges a bit of sympathy for the White House Press Secretary: “I don’t see why everyone says Carney is such a loser. Poor [guy] is facing the Kobiashi Maru _every_ day….”, referring to the no-win training scenario from Star Trek.

I look forward to the bumper sticker, “Obama 2012: Remember, None of This Is His Fault.”

We’ve seen this image before: Barack Obama putting the final touches on an important economic speech calling for stimulus spending, job creation, infrastructure investment, assistance to those hit by the housing crisis and an extension of unemployment benefits.

As the president prepares to deliver a pivotal address to a joint session of Congress on Thursday, it seems like a replay of the economic agenda he outlined when seeking the Democratic nomination.

“To put Americans to work, we’ll create millions of new green jobs and invest in rebuilding our nation’s infrastructure,” Obama proclaimed in March 2008. “It’s an agenda that starts with providing a stimulus that will reach the most vulnerable Americans, including immediate relief to areas hardest hit by the housing crisis and a significant extension of unemployment insurance for those who are out of work.”

While Obama pursued those measures early in his administration, his emphasis later shifted. But the president is once again preparing to use a dramatic platform to call for immediate spending to drive economic growth.

Top White House officials have long thought that significant action to bolster the economic recovery was necessary, but concluded that there was no political appetite for new spending. The significant deterioration in the economy — which is in far worse shape than the president anticipated — has made them revisit that calculation.

snip….

In his speech Thursday, Obama’s prescriptions will be in the same mold as they were in 2008 — infrastructure spending; housing aid, including an expanded refinance program ;and new measures to assist the unemployed, administration officials say. They will also include tax cuts to give extra cash to workers and spur hiring, as well as aid for states and localities. The cost of the programs is likely to be at least $200 billion, and a reluctant Congress would have to approve many of the ideas.

The clearest indication yet that the nation’s economic recovery has basically stalled came last week when the government reported that the economy added no jobs in August. And in an ominous sign for his political prospects, Obama’s economists also projected that the unemployment rate would remain around 9 percent through the end of 2012, far higher than they had said when he took office.

In his defense, Obama’s advisers like to point out — as the White House did last week — that 2.4 million private sector jobs have been created in the past 18 months.

But that ignores the portion of the economy where Obama has the most influence: government jobs, which have seen significant losses. When those are taken into account, the economy has added far fewer jobs — 1.7 million — over the past 18 months.

Feds to assume control of Bastrop County fire; Texas Volunteer Firemen Turned Away..

Gonzalez Cannon News Daily ^ | 9/6/11

BASTROP — Firefighting-trained volunteers from around the state converged on Bastrop and Smithville Tuesday to lend a hand to the beleaguered local firefighters battling the Bastrop County Complex Fire — only to be sent away as federal officials arrived at the scene and took command, apparently because local officials never made a formal request for volunteers.

“We were at the station getting set up into strike teams, and this guy came up and said that the U.S. Forest Service had ‘assumed control of the situation, and that ‘If you don’t have a vehicle that squirts water, go home,’” said Gordon Greer of Kirbyville, who drove all night Monday to arrive in the town beset by the worst wildfire in Texas history. “You’ve got guys who had driven all night long from Corpus Christi and Brownsville on their own dime, and they turned them away. He was really a (bleep) about it.

“There was a whole line of beige cars that came in this morning, tinted windows and such,” Greer said.

A spokesperson with the U.S. National Interagency Incident Center, Jennifer Jones, confirmed that federal group of several different agencies would be assuming command in Bastrop County around 1 p.m. Tuesday, but had not done so when the firefighting volunteers were told to leave. April Saginor with the Texas Forest Service said her agency had not given any such order, to her knowledge, but promised to provide an update later in the day.

The question is apparently one of protocol, however.

The Bastrop County Office of Emergency Management announced via its Facebook account Tuesday afternoon that “Any fire mutual aid requests would always come through (and to) Local, State and National fire service and emergency leadership. This message sent as per Texas Fire Chiefs, TIFMAS, IAFC, USFA and FEMA. If you are a fire fighter wanting to volunteer you have to be activated by the National Forestry Service first.”

The Texas Forest Service issued a statement Tuesday evening that it is not requesting firefighters/retired firefighters to report to Central Texas.

“If a person wants to fight fire they can: 1. Apply for a full-time Texas Forest Service position. We are not hiring seasonals as we currently do not have the time to hire, train and certify them. 2. Join a local fire department. 3. Members of local departments should not self-dispatch. Have your fire chief contact TIFMAS Coordinator Joe Florentino at jflorentino@littleelm.org”

Several of the volunteers voiced their displeasure, however, at federal agents taking charge at the scene after appeals by Texas Gov. Rick Perry for federal aid following another series of wildfires earlier this year was turned down.

“They’re willing to sacrifice the lives of the people of Bastrop just so they can come in here and pull rank,” said Daniel Miller of Nederland, who had led a group of Texas Nationalist Movement members who were certified firefighters to Bastrop from the Beaumont area. Miller said he and several other members of the group would remain in the Bastrop area to aid with civilian relief efforts.

Feds to assume control of Bastrop County fire; Texas Volunteer Firemen Turned Away..

Gonzalez Cannon News Daily ^ | 9/6/11

BASTROP — Firefighting-trained volunteers from around the state converged on Bastrop and Smithville Tuesday to lend a hand to the beleaguered local firefighters battling the Bastrop County Complex Fire — only to be sent away as federal officials arrived at the scene and took command, apparently because local officials never made a formal request for volunteers.

“We were at the station getting set up into strike teams, and this guy came up and said that the U.S. Forest Service had ‘assumed control of the situation, and that ‘If you don’t have a vehicle that squirts water, go home,’” said Gordon Greer of Kirbyville, who drove all night Monday to arrive in the town beset by the worst wildfire in Texas history. “You’ve got guys who had driven all night long from Corpus Christi and Brownsville on their own dime, and they turned them away. He was really a (bleep) about it.

“There was a whole line of beige cars that came in this morning, tinted windows and such,” Greer said.

A spokesperson with the U.S. National Interagency Incident Center, Jennifer Jones, confirmed that federal group of several different agencies would be assuming command in Bastrop County around 1 p.m. Tuesday, but had not done so when the firefighting volunteers were told to leave. April Saginor with the Texas Forest Service said her agency had not given any such order, to her knowledge, but promised to provide an update later in the day.

The question is apparently one of protocol, however.

The Bastrop County Office of Emergency Management announced via its Facebook account Tuesday afternoon that “Any fire mutual aid requests would always come through (and to) Local, State and National fire service and emergency leadership. This message sent as per Texas Fire Chiefs, TIFMAS, IAFC, USFA and FEMA. If you are a fire fighter wanting to volunteer you have to be activated by the National Forestry Service first.”

The Texas Forest Service issued a statement Tuesday evening that it is not requesting firefighters/retired firefighters to report to Central Texas.

“If a person wants to fight fire they can: 1. Apply for a full-time Texas Forest Service position. We are not hiring seasonals as we currently do not have the time to hire, train and certify them. 2. Join a local fire department. 3. Members of local departments should not self-dispatch. Have your fire chief contact TIFMAS Coordinator Joe Florentino at jflorentino@littleelm org”

Several of the volunteers voiced their displeasure, however, at federal agents taking charge at the scene after appeals by Texas Gov. Rick Perry for federal aid following another series of wildfires earlier this year was turned down.

“They’re willing to sacrifice the lives of the people of Bastrop just so they can come in here and pull rank,” said Daniel Miller of Nederland, who had led a group of Texas Nationalist Movement members who were certified firefighters to Bastrop from the Beaumont area. Miller said he and several other members of the group would remain in the Bastrop area to aid with civilian relief efforts.

” the same mold as they were in 2008 — infrastructure spending; housing aid, including an expanded refinance program ;and new measures to assist the unemployed, administration officials say.”

Good ideas — if he would just DO those things.

“Obama’s advisers like to point out — as the White House did last week — that 2.4 million private sector jobs have been created in the past 18 months.
But that ignores the portion of the economy where Obama has the most influence: government jobs, which have seen significant losses.”

Duh. Is it ‘cutting government spending, cutting the deficit, eliminating waste’ — or is it “losses” of government jobs?

I’m no Perry supporter but these “dirty” tricks are courtesy of the White House..

This obstructionism is definitely aimed at Perry. HURT Texas so Perry STAYS HOME and MISS the DEBATES.
__________________________________

Contract Dispute Grounds Firefighting Planes
by Audrey Hudson

09/07/2011

Nearly half of the federal government’s firefighting air tankers are siting idle at a California airport, grounded by the Obama administration in a contract dispute just weeks before wildfires swept through Texas killing a mother and her child, and destroying 100,000 acres.

The massive blazes forced Texas Gov. and Republican presidential hopeful Rick Perry​ to abruptly call off a campaign appearance in South Carolina earlier this week to respond to the crisis, and may force him to cancel his first debate appearance Wednesday night.

The U.S. Forest Service terminated the contract with Aero Union five weeks ago to operate seven P-3 Orions that are critical to the agency’s firefighting mission, leaving the federal government with 11 tankers under contract to help battle more than 50 large uncontained wildfires now burning nationwide.

That’s down from 40 tankers used by the Forest Service just a decade ago, according to Rep. Dan Lungren (R.-Calif.), chairman of the House Committee on Administration, who is challenging the decision to dismiss the largest provider of heavy air-tanker support to the federal government.

“We were certified to fly all season, but they just terminated us and threw 60 people out of work and left the country vulnerable to fires, as you can see right now in Texas,” said Britt Gourley, CEO for Aero Union.

“This is our 50th anniversary fighting fires for the Forest Service. It’s not quite the way we wanted to celebrate it,” Gourley said.

Gourley said the government did not provide details on why the contract was canceled, but that they did not agree with Aero Union’s 15-year maintenance plan.

“We wanted to sit down with them and ask why it was canceled and find a quick resolution, but they didn’t want to talk about it. They just said, ‘We don’t want the airplanes, have a nice life,’ ” Gourley said. “I had to let go of my staff–60 people and their families were devastated,” Gourley said. “It’s really been tragic.”

The Forest Service says it will not use aircraft that does not meet its requirements, and in this case that included the long-term airworthiness inspection program, although the company passed its annual inspection.

“Our main priority is protecting and saving lives, and we can’t in good conscience maintain an aviation contract where we feel lives may be put at risk due to inadequate safety practices,” said Tom Harbour, director of the Forest Services fire and aviation management program.

In a letter to the administration questioning the canceled contracts that was obtained by HUMAN EVENTS, Lungren said the aircraft “are some of the best available for fighting fires in the United States.”

“The [Federal Aviation Administration​] representative stated that the disrupted contract issues which led to the grounding of Aero Union’s entire fleet do not relate to the suitability of these aircraft to perform for the remainder of this fire season,” Lungren said in the Aug. 15 letter to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, whose agency oversees the Forest Service.

In addition to the 11 tankers in the fleet still operating, two air tankers are under contract to operate on-call, and up to eight military firefighting aircraft can be called to assist if needed.

Aero Union operated six Lockheed P-3 Orions, and was preparing to add a seventh to the fleet when the contract was canceled. The four-engine turboprops were originally used as anti-submarine and maritime surveillance aircraft that were built for the U.S. Navy.

Ultimately, those aircraft will be replaced with two-engine CV 580s from Canada, which Lungren said is “worrisome” because those aircraft will carry a smaller load of fuel-retardant and require more downtime.

[ This is written in snake oil but worth doing anyway. I seem to have snake oil on the brain tonight. ]

Letter from National Resources Defense Council president regarding Obama’s caving in to ‘big oil’ and dumping smog protection rule

“President Obama just dropped us like a hot potato.

It happened on Friday, without warning, when the President cozied up to America’s biggest polluters and killed life-saving ozone smog rules that his EPA has been working on diligently for years.

[T]he President’s pro-polluter stance is getting to be a bad habit. In the last month alone, the Obama Administration has given Shell tentative approval to drill off the coast of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge … flashed a preliminary green light for the disastrous Keystone XL tar sands pipeline … and now sided with corporate interests over every American who needs to breathe.
[….]
And they have absolutely no reason to stop selling out our family’s health and natural heritage to big polluters until they feel our outrage and anger.

I urge you to pick up the phone right now and give President Obama a piece of your mind.

Call the White House comment line at: 202-456-1111.

Tell the President you’re shocked at his decision to reject new standards for ozone smog. Tell him to defend the Clean Air Act against the latest attacks by House Republicans during his jobs speech on Thursday night. And urge him to show leadership once again by rejecting the Keystone XL tars sands pipeline, which could doom any hope for the clean energy future he promised us.

“In the two and half years since President Obama signed his signature jobs bill, the so-called stimulus,” Mr. McConnell said, “there are 1.7 million fewer jobs in this country.” The Labor Department says that nonfarm payroll employment totaled 131.1 million in August, compared with 132.8 million in February 2009.

In this article, read “HRC” in the place of “Obama”. Waffles has no idea what ‘smart power’ means and no plans whatsoever. He did not go to the mats for State/AID or Defense, HRC and Bob Gates did.

But Waffles is great on buckling, caving or whatever. The Repugs want to pull the rug out from under HRC, the only light in the executive branch, and you can be sure Waffles will do nothing to stop them.
*********

Obama’s “smart power” plan risks death of 1,000 cuts

By Susan Cornwell and Andrew Quinn

WASHINGTON | Wed Sep 7, 2011 7:07am EDT

(Reuters) – President Barack Obama’s pledge to boost America’s global standing by ramping up U.S. diplomacy and development aid faces death by a thousand cuts as lawmakers prepare to carve huge chunks out of U.S. overseas spending to address budget shortfalls.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) could be chopped back significantly.

Food aid to hungry countries, training for political parties in young democracies, improved medical services for expectant mothers and the U.S. response to natural disasters such as earthquakes and droughts could be hit in a major scale-back of U.S. assistance.

Republican congresswoman Kay Granger, an advocate of the cuts, said recently that with U.S. debt mounting, the focus should be on aid programs that demonstrate quick impact and further U.S. national security.

“In the past we’ve sometimes measured success by the size of the check we write. Today, we have to measure our success by the size of the change we bring,” Granger, chairwoman of the House foreign aid subcommittee, told colleagues.

Aid analysts say the budget storm could undo Obama’s “smart power” approach, which elevates diplomacy and development alongside military power as guarantors of U.S. security in a rapidly changing world.

The cuts — some real, some proposed — are looming despite repeated pronouncements from top U.S. officials, including former Defense Secretary Robert Gates, on the need to reverse the over-militarization of America’s engagement abroad.

“What is under threat is the understanding that the U.S. engagement in the world must be broader than a military engagement,” said Samuel Worthington of InterAction, an alliance of U.S.-based nongovernmental organizations. “The more we pull back, the less leverage we have.”

The State Department’s budget planner, Deputy Secretary of State Thomas Nides, said diplomatic and development spending took a massive hit this year and more pain may be on the way.

“Although its unclear what’s going to happen in 2012, we could face more catastrophic cuts” in the coming months, Nides said at a recent event in Washington. “These cuts could be the most significant we’ve had in two decades, and they could have a devastating impact on the work that we do.”

A HARROWING YEAR

For proponents of U.S. international programs, proposals in Congress of more budget cuts follow a harrowing year in fiscal 2011 that has seen budget hawks empowered both by Republican electoral gains and grim news about the U.S. deficit.

Congress has already lopped some $8 billion off Obama’s request for the State Department and U.S. foreign aid this year as part of a deal with the White House to keep the U.S. government running.

Lawmakers also chopped the Economic Support Fund, which helps stabilize fragile governments from the Middle East to South Asia.

Hundreds of millions of dollars have been sliced from U.S. contributions to the United Nations and international organizations, hitting peacekeeping and the World Food Program. Funds for international banks were cut and pay raises for U.S. foreign service officers were prohibited.

House Republicans have proposed whacking another $8.6 billion from the budget for the State Department and foreign aid in fiscal 2012, starting October 1.

As the worst famine in decades stalks millions in East Africa, 29 percent would be cut from the overall account that funds Obama’s initiative for fighting global hunger, “Feed the Future,” according to the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition.

The deficit-cutting deal between Obama and Congress in August set out $917 billion in overall savings, which puts more pressure on foreign aid along with other programs.

Lawmakers must now find another $1.2-$1.5 trillion in deficit reduction across the government over a decade.

Unpopular foreign assistance may be the first to go.

“Anything that smacks of spending money overseas … is going to be in jeopardy,” said Stan Collender, a former staffer on House and Senate budget committees who is now a partner at Qorvis Communications.

With Obama’s backing, Clinton fought to broaden U.S. engagement with the world, arguing that America can only guarantee its long-term security by helping to roll back the root causes of instability, including poverty.

“We must use what has been called smart power — the full range of tools at our disposal — diplomatic, economic, military, political, legal, and cultural — picking the right tool, or combination of tools, for each situation. With smart power, diplomacy will be the vanguard of foreign policy,” Clinton said at her confirmation hearing in 2009.

MILITARY SPENDING DWARFS THAT ON DIPLOMACY

The Obama administration put significant resources into play. In fiscal 2010, the amount appropriated for the State Department, diplomacy and foreign aid was $55.1 billion, up from $50.5 billion a year before, according to the Congressional Research Service. Of this, $37.5 billion went for foreign aid and the agency that administers it, USAID.

But by the time appropriations were agreed for fiscal 2011, spending on the State Department and USAID combined fell to $49 billion; the foreign aid chunk of this was $33 billion.

The numbers are dwarfed by U.S. military spending, which clocked in at $688.6 billion for fiscal 2011.

Harvard international affairs expert Joseph Nye, often credited with coining the term “smart power,” said Clinton and Obama had made strides in coordinating work between the Pentagon and the State Department. But some of those gains were now at risk.

“The Pentagon is a giant while State is a pygmy in budgetary terms. Starving the pygmy will not help solve the problem,” Nye told Reuters.

Democrats like Representative Nita Lowey fret that both State and USAID could see operating budgets cut by as much as 35 percent.

“It’s really very sad … I worked very hard with Secretary Clinton to build up the State Department, and the same with USAID,” said Lowey, former chairwoman of the House appropriations subcommittee on foreign aid.

USAID has long ridden a budgetary roller-coaster. The agency was scaled back by Republicans in the 1990s after the Cold War’s end. Then after the September 11, 2001 attacks, aid and public diplomacy programs were hastily rebuilt.

“I really do think this is repeating an historical mistake,” said John Norris, a former USAID field disaster expert now at the Center for American Progress.

USAID Deputy Administrator Donald Steinberg emphasized that the agency was becoming leaner and meaner, seeking to focus its development efforts and establish a more cost-effective model — albeit one that would require short-term budget support.

“We are in the midst of implementing the most significant reforms perhaps in the history of this agency to try to expand our capability to use resources effectively,” Steinberg said.

“In many cases, we are eliminating smaller programs so that we can focus our attention — even in a reduced budget environment — on strategic priority. That means focusing on areas like food security, global health, global climate change, democracy and governance and economic growth,” he said.

The State Department’s Nides said a new $8 billion contingency fund for operations in frontline countries such as Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq could preserve essential spending there.

But this summer’s deficit-reduction deal put new caps on “security” spending, which is defined as defense, homeland security, intelligence, nuclear weapons, diplomacy and foreign aid, for fiscal 2012 as well as 2013. That could set up fights for cash among competing agencies.

“There is real risk the Congress could decide to shield defense spending and other categories of spending by cutting everything else,” Nides said.

The U.S. Forest Service terminated the contract with Aero Union five weeks ago to operate seven P-3 Orions that are critical to the agency’s firefighting mission, leaving the federal government with 11 tankers under contract to help battle more than 50 large uncontained wildfires now burning nationwide.

That’s down from 40 tankers used by the Forest Service just a decade ago

“This obstructionism is definitely aimed at Perry. HURT Texas so Perry STAYS HOME and MISS the DEBATES.”

==================

Kind of prescient of Obama to terminate the contract five weeks ago, just in hope some fires would start and hurt Perry. Really magical of him to get the whole fleet reduced over the past decade.

Sounds more like some Bush admin economizing. Who needs socialistic forests, anyway.

Obama team torn over big jobs speech? This big New York Times piece will drive some discussion on the left today. It reports that Obama and his team are frustrated over how to recapture the aura that enabled him to get elected in 2008, and suggests tension between two conflicting impulses: Drawing a sharp and feisty contrast with conservatives, and striving to project a willingness to compromise with Republicans, even though they’re trying to destroy his presidency.

Seemingly in service of the latter goal, the piece reports that Obama’s team is discussing a a moratorium on some regulations, supporting the idea that government is stifling the economy:

The frustration has led to internal divisions among some advisers over the scope of his economic address to a joint session of Congress on Thursday night. The president intends to offer at least some progressive proposals to help regain a fighting posture that he has not had since the health care debate, but a provision is also being discussed to place a new moratorium on some regulations that affect the economy, excluding health care and financial rules. The proposals are likely to infuriate an already unhappy Democratic base.

“He’s erred on the side of trying to reason with unreasonable people, which seems to be the wrong strategy,” said Andy Stern, the former president of the Service Employees International Union.

This is likely to anger the left, which will see this as yet another attempt to reach for the mythical “center” by validating the conservative economic and anti-regulatory worldview. But I would urge a bit of caution. The White House has long insisted that reports on internal divisions and Obama’s “repositioning” are overstated. Whether that’s true or not, I hope folks will wait to see the details of Obama’s speech before reaching any conclusions about an impending “sell out,” particularly since most signs suggest Obama’s team is eager to draw a sharp contrast with the GOP on jobs this fall. In the wake of Obama’s move on the EPA, the worry is understandable, but this is crying out for less reacting and more reporting.

* Obama to replay 2008 push for stimulus spending: Indeed, Zachary Goldfarb reports that Obama’s speech will sound like a rerun of his 2008 campaign push for more spending to boost the economy, and advisers are insisting that his posture on the economy hasn’t changed.

* Obama mulling introduction of a jobs bill? Buried in this Politico story about Obama’s political travails is a key nugget of news: Obama is considering introducing the jobs plan he will unveil Thursday as an actual jobs bill.

The report doesn’t have any details, but a jobs bill is something lefty commentators have been pushing for in the belief that it may be the only way to capture public attention and shift the conversation in Washington towards jobs.

* The next big labor brawl: The Communications Workers of America continues to pound away at Delta Airlines with a new Web video vowing victory in the fight over House GOP efforts to insert into the long-term FAA reauthorization a provision making it harder to organize airline and railway workers:

Hey, remember when it was an unhinged, unfair, right-wing smear to charge that Obama was obliviously and aloofly golfing his way through a four-year national recession?

Yeah, check out the cartoon of Tom Toles, the Washington Post’s editorial cartoonist and often no friend of conservatives, today:

Obama, golfing, is told, ‘pivot to jobs, not divot.’

But hey, no respectable liberal columnist would echo that theme. Let me flip to a different section of that paper and turn to Courtland Milloy, always good for some Republican-bashing and a hearty defense of the president…

“I don’t know about you, but I’m not scared of tough times,” Obama said in Detroit.

That’s a pretty dim ray, Mr. President.

Of course you’re not scared of tough times. What’s to be scared of when you’re fresh from a $50,000-a-week vacation on Martha’s Vineyard? Going to an oceanside villa last month while millions are losing their homes and jobs suggests you don’t know much about these tough times. And stop trying to sound like a Baptist preacher when you say, “I don’t know about you,” least people start to take it literally.

Admit it, you’re going to click on the link to double-check that it’s really from Courtland Milloy. That sounds like something that Andy McCarthy or Michael Walsh or someone else at NRO would write.

Give credit to some of our friends on the Left. While they’ll never quite come out and admit that they completely misjudged the president in 2007 and 2008, at least now they see the same flaws that we’ve seen in Obama since the beginning.

This is likely to anger the left, which will see this as yet another attempt to reach for the mythical “center” by validating the conservative economic and anti-regulatory worldview. [….] I hope folks will wait to see the details of Obama’s speech before reaching any conclusions about an impending “sell out,”

Republicans refuse to give affirmation to Obama’s speech, Pelosi has a fit.

Pelosi Peeved Republicans Opt Out of Rebuttal to Obama Speech

Republicans have decided they’re not going to give a rebuttal to President Obama’s jobs speech later this week, a decision House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi took as a high affront to the White House.

At least three GOP lawmakers also have announced they’re not going to show up for the presidential address. House Speaker John Boehner’s office then confirmed Tuesday evening that nobody from the party would deliver an official televised response.

Pelosi said the party’s “silence” would “speak volumes about their lack of commitment to creating jobs.”

“The Republicans’ refusal to respond to the president’s proposal on jobs is not only disrespectful to him, but to the American people,” Pelosi said.

But Boehner spokesman Mike Steel said Obama’s proposals on Thursday “will rise or fall on their own merits,” suggesting a GOP response was not needed.

“Republicans are, and have been, entirely focused on job creation. Every member of Congress, and — more importantly — the American people, will provide a reaction to the president’s address,” Steel said.

Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., said there will be “plenty” of response to the president’s speech on Friday, but told Fox News he suspects the reason there’s no formal response is “the speaker doesn’t expect to hear much to respond to.”

Some members of Congress, though, won’t be there when Obama delivers his address to a Joint Session of Congress.

Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., has said he doesn’t think he’ll attend — he told Fox News he’s “sick and tired of speeches.” Rep. Joe Walsh, R-Ill., also said he’d skip, writing on his Twitter page that he has no interest in being a “prop” for Obama’s speech. Rep. Paul Broun, R-Ga., will not attend either.

Dana Perino, former press secretary for George W. Bush, said the lawmakers should attend the session because “you’re an elected leader, and it’s quite a privilege to be able to be there.”

As for a GOP rebuttal, Perino said there is a downside to it in that it always makes the opposition look small in comparison to the president.

“This is not a State of the Union address, but still tradition would say there should be a rebuttal. I don’t think it’s necessary, the game is starting,” Perino said, referring to the first game of the NFL season, which immediately follows the president’s speech.

Perino said congressional leaders have opened Statuary Hall in the Capitol to allow any member of Congress to talk to the media.

It doesn’t matter when the contract was signed. The president’s job is to secure the safety and welfare of the country. He should have send the necessary equipment immediately for securing life and limb to Texas Residents dieing and burnt out of their domiciles..

Just the fact that he is turning a blind eye to the ‘contract’ flap speaks volumes of what he is all about.
The sick mind running the country and we all sit here with our hands in our pockets. Makes you wonder who is sicker; him or us-

I know first hand that people can perform, without money and a signed contract, on vocal orders of the Commander. I have see it used at the beginning of the financial year, when funding had not been release down to the installation level, and they had to allow the pilots to fly to protect the area.

The Republican National Committee continued to hit President Barack Obama’s handling of the economy Wednesday with a new web video highlighting the national unemployment rate.

The minute-long spot plays back-to-back clips from the president over the past two years saying he is focused on job creation and tracks the unemployment rate during the same time. It ends with “SAME WORDS. SAME SPEECHES. SAME FAILED POLICIES” written across the screen.

“For the past two and a half years, President Obama has repeatedly promised to focus on jobs, but, instead, he has prioritized taxing, spending and regulating,” RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said in a statement. “With ZERO jobs created in the month of August, it’s time to change direction.”

When Obama came into office, in January 2009, the national unemployment rate was at 7.8 percent. It peaked in October of 2009 at 10.1 percent and is currently at 9.1 percent.

Republican radio ads, launched Tuesday, will also air in battleground states across the country, voicing similar criticism of the president.

“After a 10-day luxury vacation on Martha’s Vineyard, the president says he’ll finally get serious about jobs,” the ad says. “But we’ve heard this before.”

The ramped up campaign comes as Obama is scheduled to unveil his jobs plan to a joint session of Congress Thursday.

The Democratic National Committee responded to the RNC with a “fact check” explaining how Republican policies have hurt job creation in the U.S. and taking aim at current presidential contenders.

“The Tea Party platform that Mitt Romney, Rick Perry and the rest have signed on to, including the Tea Party economic plan passed by the House over the summer, would cost the U.S. millions of jobs and grind our economy to a halt – all in the name of a far right wing ideology that places a higher priority on shielding the wealthy from paying their fair share over helping the middle class get ahead and creating jobs,” DNC Press Secretary Melanie Roussell said in a statement.

Same old, same old: Republicans had a 10-point edge Tues in nv02 race early voting in Washoe County. Only 3 days of early voting left. Tunrout in Democratic Clark County is putrid (under 10%) in nv02 race, especially for Dems. GOPers have 50%-33% in one area Dems should do well.

Is the enthusiasm gap already showing?

Updated (but not quite complete) early/mail voting numbers for 2 weeks in nv02 show GOP still maintaining huge lead :

WTMJ-TV (Channel 4) will air NBC’s coverage of the festivities prior to Thursday night’s game between the Green Bay Packers and New Orleans Saints instead of President Barack Obama’s speech on unemployment, the station announced Tuesday. The station will air local news at 6 p.m. and NBC’s pregame coverage at 6:30 p.m.

I am now fascinated by the history of the Labor movement and unions. Lotta complex stories there and a lot of people simply demanding a decent wage and safe work environments. But it seems to me that the “management” of the unions has gone off the deep end. I deal sporadically with union employees but it is almost always negative and that confounds me. There is such an us versus them mentality and it oozes from the workers. A terrible environment for hospitality service. Big issue is always booze. Most parties we get called in for are huge and have open bars. My workers are not permitted to take a drink order when we do union gigs. I guess the thought is people still tip when there is an open bar

Kingsgrove, you’re right that the David Gergen quote is the first time a very big media/political person has said what many of us know. That it is an actual Gergan quote, not a paraphrase by a JournoLIster, is also important.

We know there are a lot of efforts at the moment to try and figure out what to do (our Hillary series will start soon, probably next week) to get Obama out and Hillary in but there is a lot of fear and head scratching. Gergen is important because he will clue in rank and file Dimocrats who don’t know much and still support Obama. Those Dimocrats who are not in on the discussions now also know that such discussions are indeed ongoing.

DAVID GERGEN: I must tell you now there are people in the Democratic Party who wonder whether there’s any possibility of him stepping aside in favour of Hillary Clinton.

Of late, I’ve been rummaging through old screen clippings. Found the following but have no link. Article is ABC but post was at gateway:

Well, today’s race has one Democrat concerned anyway. [The race was MA Senate where Scott Brown won over Obama-backed Coakley.] Democrat Evan Bayh warned Democrats of the lessons of today’s catastrophic loss in Massachusetts: ignoring the lessons of this race will ‘lead to even further catastrophe’ for their party. ;There’s going to be a tendency on the part of our people to be in denial about all this,’ Bayh told ABC News, but ‘if you lose Massachusetts and that’s not a wake-up call, there’s no hope of waking up.’ What is that lesson? For Senator Bayh the lesson is that the party pushed an agenda that is too far to the left, alienating moderat and independent voters. “It’s why noderates and independents even in a state as Democratic as Massachusetts just aren’t buying our message,” he said. “They just don’t believe the answers we are currently proposing are solving their problems. That’s something that has to be corrected.”
end of screen clip.

Bayh predicted way after admin, but still way ahead of most other Dims. Chickens are coming home. Wonder what Bayh is doing, thinking, today?

Ruminating a bit more, I so often think of Jeremiah Wright, and how O sounds more like him each day. I’ve noticed a recent call for O to get tougher. Seems O equates tougher with rants and raves … as if he is still at Trinity UCC only now he is in the pulpit!

I guess because she took a bullet in the head, which was totally underserved, I think she is owed a lot of slack. If she cashs in, so be it I don’t think she planned it, but just happened to be chosen by a deranged person.

Ed Gillespie, a former RNC Chairman, said the result that jumped out the most to him was that 60 percent of respondents said that Obama has been a weaker leader than the expected when his term began; 33 percent said he was “much weaker” than they expected. He says he thinks this helps explain what he calls “incendiary” language coming from President Obama and his allies.

Pollster Whit Ayers says “it’s not just the economy he promised to be a strong and unifying president, and increasingly, voters doubt that he has been that or that he can be that.”

Among the other results:

By almost every measure, President Obama’s prospects for reelection are bad.

Most Americans:

• Think the country is on the wrong track (67 percent);

• Think his policies have made things worse for most Americans (50 percent);

• Disapprove of Obama’s job performance (50 percent);

• Disapprove of his handling of the economy (57 percent);

• Think it is time to give someone else a chance to be President (52 percent).

Moreover, intensity is very much on the side of those who view Obama unfavorably, including among Independent voters:

• Those who believe he has turned out to be a much weaker leader than they thought he would be outnumber those who believe he turned out to be muchstronger by 33-13 percent (with Independents at 36-7);

• Those who think his policies have made the economy much worse outnumberthose who think they made it much better by 32-13 percent (with Independents at 33-6);

• Those who strongly disapprove of his job performance outnumber those who strongly approve by 36-23 percent (with Independents at 37-14 percent);

• Those who strongly disapprove of his handling of the economy outnumber thosewho strongly approve by 45-18 percent (with Independents at 48-10).

Obama was intended to be the first non black black in power, and he is going to be the first non black blamed as black to keep all blacks out of power for a generation……..and by that time Pedro will have become so numerous that the black vote will be tossed to the GOP like Asians as they won’t matter.

…..

I actually pity Obama in his position now, as he has had things done for him his entire life, in always being the token black kid who was special olympics.
That joke of his is going to come back and bite him, as just as the mentally retarded if they were put into Harvard, given book deals and put into the White House………….someone who is retarded in that position would not be able to cope with that kind of responsibility when the people who are carrying your water suddenly stop.
It is like that round table Ulsterman exposed in the shrinking Obama……….what that meeting revealed is the chameleon Obama is. He knows how to blow into a room like a storm to impress, but after the windbag blows out, he has no ability to follow through, so he becomes bored after his performance and Jarrett has to tell the room what Obama thinks.

….

Nothing has changed in this ok. It is still the RFK coup on LBJ. Yes the price went up, Obama’s contract was bought, and now it is a matter of leveraging Hillary in ASAP without her being blamed by blacks with Jeb jr. hiding about the place trying to get the GOP to lose in 2012. Hillary apparently only got a 4 year deal and Jeb is supposed to take over in 2016, according to the Prescott Bush plan.

It is all just falling apart for Obama, and Marine One was Mr. Obama’s opportunity to exit the building on his own accord. If he does not resign, then this moves to the next notch Darrell Issa is being employed for and what Deep Tutu is engaged in, as Eric Holder is removed and justice becomes a landmine, in which Bill Daley deep throats Mr. Obama in saying, “Mr. Obama sir, if you do steal this next election, you will be ruined by 2014 in thee same coup which Richard Nixon faced……..and this time Mr. Obama, you will face prison as your legacy”.

“A more important number that our pollsters say is in there is this idea that is this a long-term setback for him or a short-term one? 54-percent said long-term. Our pollsters are concerned. That’s kind of numbers you have when the public starts to give up on a president as a problem solver,” NBC’s Chuck Todd said on the “Nightly News.”

Nothing has changed in this ok. It is still the RFK coup on LBJ. Yes the price went up, Obama’s contract was bought, and now it is a matter of leveraging Hillary in ASAP without her being blamed by blacks with Jeb jr. hiding about the place trying to get the GOP to lose in 2012. Hillary apparently only got a 4 year deal and Jeb is supposed to take over in 2016, according to the Prescott Bush plan.

It is all just falling apart for Obama, and Marine One was Mr. Obama’s opportunity to exit the building on his own accord. If he does not resign, then this moves to the next notch Darrell Issa is being employed for and what Deep Tutu is engaged in, as Eric Holder is removed and justice becomes a landmine, in which Bill Daley deep throats Mr. Obama in saying, “Mr. Obama sir, if you do steal this next election, you will be ruined by 2014 in thee same coup which Richard Nixon faced……..and this time Mr. Obama, you will face prison as your legacy”.
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So, this means Hillary would only have one term to right this country? It won’t be enough. She needs the full eight years, even then, the country would maybe, be breaking even, not anywhere near repaired of the damage this sick president has inflicted on us. (with the help of the Republicans, I might add-) Jeb’s job is miniscule in comparison to the task before Hillary. It is a lopsided trade off and BushI has to give more. He has to give more because of the mistake made denying Hillary the presidency in the first place, and using the Republican Party to do so- He has to trade for his past mistake and the damage done because his poor decision making didn’t include the price to be paid for the amount of damage caused by his lusty judgement for the seat of power. Time for BushI to pay the piper. It has to come out of his hide that he screwed up so badly for his Daddy! Tell him to put it in the Will and for God’s sake, stop jumping out of planes if he wants to live to see Jeb president!

The once-muscular presidency of Barack Obama has undergone a dramatic downsizing – in power, popularity, prestige and ambition – to the point where even Obama die-hards are starting to question his ability to right the economy or win reelection.

Three polls in a single day Tuesday all told the same sorry tale – the avatar of hope and change, the slayer of Osama bin Laden, the president with dreams of a billion-dollar reelection campaign – is losing popular support and bleeding political power fifteen months ahead of Election Day.

“He has sort of lost the sense of power and mystique of the presidency,” says longtime Obama ally Andy Stern, former president of the powerful Service Employees International Union. “There’s also a sense that people aren’t scared of him. That’s very dangerous.”

admin, its all building into the perfect storm and somehow i think the eye of the hurricane hits his ass tomorrow night at his “jobs” speech when does a suicide political bomb on himself.
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Yes, and they should all get up in unison and WALK-OUT!

The height of disrespect- Leave him there talking about moonbeams and unicorns and the magical forest he came from. No one cares- if he needs a push to get him out- a full walk-out ought to do it!

President Obama’s new effort to revive the ailing economy may be too little, too late, according to Democrats and liberal policy experts.

They contend that Obama missed his chance to turn the economy around by November 2012, but still want him to call on Congress to move an aggressive new jobs plan — even if it has little chance of passing.

Obama should swing for the fences during his speech on Thursday, they say, claiming there is no need to be politically pragmatic with the House in GOP hands. ” The risk for Obama, however, is that he could appear weak by putting forth a jobs proposal that is immediately viewed as dead on arrival on Capitol Hill.

Liberal activists say the best chances for passing legislation that would have really spurred growth was in the last Congress, when Democrats controlled the House and as many as 60 seats in the Senate.

There are new limits about to be put into place on cash welfare benefits.

On Tuesday Governor Rick Snyder signed into law a stricter, 4-year lifetime limit on benefits. The governor says the change is needed to make sure the system isn’t abused.

“We are returning cash assistance to its original intent as a transitional program to help families while they work toward self-sufficiency,” Snyder said in a statement.

Enforcing the limit will save the state more than $60 million a year.

People in need who have reached the 4-year-limit will still be able to receive food stamps and health care assistance.

There are also exemptions in place to protect those truly in need. The governor points out that those with a disability who can’t work, seniors, and those who care for a disabled spouse or child may still qualify for benefits.

The Michigan League for Human Services says change in law will result in about 41,000 people losing their cash assistance on October 1st. That includes 29,700 children.

“We’re very, very concerned,” Gilda Jacobs of the League told the Associated Press. “As the days go by, new people will be meeting the 48-month limit. … More will be falling off that cliff.”

Jacobs said she is concerned that the change comes during a time of high unemployment. Michigan’s July unemployment rate was 10.9%.

“We still have to preserve a safety net for people who, through no fault of their own, can’t find a job,” she said.

Just the fact that he is turning a blind eye to the ‘contract’ flap speaks volumes of what he is all about.

===================

Ya, he’s being slow to cut existing red tape, like Bush was with Katrina. But boobery doesn’t mean he’s targeting Perry — by leaving ALL states at risk for fires, since these are national forces that may be called anywhere.

“This is not a State of the Union address, but still tradition would say there should be a rebuttal. I don’t think it’s necessary, the game is starting,” Perino said, referring to the first game of the NFL season, which immediately follows the president’s speech.

NBC’s Andrea Mitchell announced on air Wednesday that she has breast cancer.

Mitchell, who has been with NBC for decades and serves as its chief foreign affairs correspondent and host of “Andrea Mitchell Reports” on MNSBC, made the announcement at the end of her show. She is 64 years old. (Watch video of her announcement above.)

“I had planned to be hiking in Wyoming last week but instead discovered that I am now among the one in eight women — incredibly, one in eight — who’ve had breast cancer,” she said. “Mine was discovered during my annual screening just a short time ago. Lucky for me, I’m one of the fortunate ones. We discovered it in the earliest stage, it has not spread, and I’m already back at work with a terrific prognosis.”

Mitchell said that breast cancer awareness and prevention has always been important to her.

“I’m looking at this as another of life’s lessons,” she said. “For you women out there and for the men who love you, screening matters. Do it.”

Other NBC journalists tweeted messages of support to Mitchell. “Bravo Andrea,” the “Today” show’s Savannah Guthrie wrote. “You are most adored.”

………………….

I wouldnt wish cancer on anyone, get well and take some time and rest.

WASHINGTON — President Obama abandoned a contentious new air pollution rule on Friday, buoying business interests that had lobbied heavily against it, angering environmentalists who called the move a betrayal and unnerving his own top environmental regulators.

The president rejected a proposed rule from the Environmental Protection Agency that would have significantly reduced emissions of smog-causing chemicals, saying that it would impose too severe a burden on industry and local governments at a time of economic distress.

Business groups and Republicans in Congress had complained that meeting the new standard, which governs emissions of so-called ground-level ozone, would cost billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of jobs.

The White House announcement came barely an hour after another weak jobs report from the Labor Department and in the midst of an intensifying political debate over the impact of federal regulations on job creation that is already a major focus of the presidential campaign.

$$$ So this appears to be an attempt to seem to be seen as “doing something” to paper over the dreadful jobs report.$$$

The president is planning a major address next week on new measures to stimulate employment. Republicans in Congress and on the campaign trail have harshly criticized a number of the administration’s environmental and health regulations, which they say are depressing hiring and forcing the export of jobs.

The E.P.A., following the recommendation of its scientific advisers, had proposed lowering the so-called ozone standard of 75 parts per billion, set at the end of the Bush administration, to a stricter standard of 60 to 70 parts per billion. The change would have thrown hundreds of American counties out of compliance with the Clean Air Act and required a major enforcement effort by state and local officials, as well as new emissions controls at industries across the country.

The administration will try to follow the more lenient Bush administration standard set in 2008 until a scheduled reconsideration of acceptable pollution limits in 2013. Environmental advocates vowed on Friday to challenge that standard in court, saying it is too weak to protect public health adequately.

$$$Bush III, anyone??

Ozone, when combined with other compounds to form smog, contributes to a variety of ailments, including heart problems, asthma and other lung disorders.

Lisa P. Jackson, the E.P.A. administrator, has pushed hard for a tougher ozone standard, telling associates that it was one of the most important regulatory initiatives she would handle during her tenure. But she found herself on the losing end of a fight with top White House economic and political advisers, who were persuaded by industry arguments that the 2008 ozone rule was due to be reviewed in two years anyway and who were concerned about the impact on state, local and tribal governments that would bear much of the burden of compliance.

The impact would have been felt heavily in a band of Midwest and Great Plains states that are not themselves major sources of ozone pollution and that will be critical 2012 electoral battlegrounds.

In a statement, the president reiterated his commitment to environmental concerns, but added: “At the same time, I have continued to underscore the importance of reducing regulatory burdens and regulatory uncertainty, particularly as our economy continues to recover. With that in mind, and after careful consideration, I have requested that Administrator Jackson withdraw the draft Ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standards at this time.”

In words of reassurance directed at Ms. Jackson and the agency she heads, the president said that his commitment to the work of the agency was “unwavering.”

$$$ Translation: “My support is unwavering, even though it completely wavered. Read my lips, no new pollution”.

“And my administration will continue to vigorously oppose efforts to weaken E.P.A.’s authority under the Clean Air Act or dismantle the progress we have made,” he said.

Ms. Jackson accepted the White House decision with a terse statement: “We will revisit the ozone standard, in compliance with the Clean Air Act.”

She pointed with pride to the administration’s record of establishing a range of other air quality safeguards for power plants, manufacturing facilities and vehicles that will also help to reduce ozone pollution across the country.

Ms. Jackson had made clear her intention to follow her scientific advisers and set a new standard within the more restrictive range by the end of this year. She has told associates that her success in addressing this problem would be a reflection of her ability to perform her job. The agency sent the now-rejected standards to the White House in July with the expectation that they would be issued by Aug. 31.

While some senior agency officials expressed disappointment with the decision, they also said they understood that it was their job to offer their best technical advice to the White House and that the ultimate decision rested with the president, who has to stand for re-election and consider other factors.

$$$ Translation: “Obama before country”.

Reaction from environmental advocates ranged from disappointment to fury, with several noting that in just the past month the administration had tentatively approved drilling in the Arctic, given an environmental green light to the 1,700-mile Keystone XL oil pipeline from Alberta, Canada, to Texas and opened 20 million more acres of the Gulf of Mexico to drilling.

$$$ Wow, so, “This is what an environmentalist looks like, eh???”

Daniel J. Weiss, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, said, “Today’s announcement from the White House that they will retreat from implementing the much-needed — and long-overdue — ozone pollution standard is deeply disappointing and grants an item on Big Oil’s wish list at the expense of the health of children, seniors and the infirm.” The center is a liberal research group with close ties to the White House.

Bill McKibben, an activist leading a two-week White House protest against the pipeline project which has resulted in more than 1,000 arrests, said that the latest move was “flabbergasting.”

“Somehow we need to get back the president we thought we elected in 2008,” he said.

$$$ Dude, you voted for the Wizard of Oz in 2008. Pay no attention to the man behind that lectern.

Cass R. Sunstein, who leads the White House office that reviews all major regulations, said he was carefully scrutinizing proposed rules across the government to ensure that they are cost efficient and based on the best current science. He said in a letter to Ms. Jackson that the studies on which the E.P.A.’s proposed rule is based were completed in 2006 and that new assessments were already under way.

The issue had become a flashpoint between the administration and Republicans in Congress, who held up the proposed ozone rule as a test of the White House’s commitment to regulatory reform and job creation. Imposing the new rule before the 2012 election would have created political problems for the administration and for Democrats nationwide seeking election in a brittle economy.

Leaders of major business groups — including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, the American Petroleum Institute and the Business Roundtable — met with Ms. Jackson and with top White House officials this summer seeking to moderate, delay or kill the rule. They told William M. Daley, the White House chief of staff, that the rule would be very costly to industry and would hurt Mr. Obama’s chances for a second term.

John Engler, a former governor of Michigan and chairman of the Business Roundtable, said Friday in a statement: “Creating U.S. jobs and providing more economic certainty for all Americans, especially on the heels of today’s news that the U.S. unemployment rate remains persistently high, is our greatest challenge. If President Obama’s speech next week is as positive as this decision was today, it will be a success.”

Representative Eric Cantor, the majority leader, said this week that the House would review the ozone rule, which he called the most onerous of all proposed regulations.

“This effective ban or restriction on construction and industrial growth for much of America is possibly the most harmful of all the currently anticipated Obama administration regulations,” Mr. Cantor wrote. He said that the impact would be felt across the economy and cost as much as $1 trillion and millions of jobs over the next decade.

NBC’s Andrea Mitchell announced on air Wednesday that she has breast cancer.
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Taking hormones to remain thin fitting in to the same clothes she wore as a teen-ager. You can’t fool mother nature. She drops her guard with your immune system when you choose substituting nature’s way with synthetic pills short circuiting the way our systems were designed to ward off cancer- and with a little help from anti-oxidants like Green Tea.

admin, you’ve been teasing us with this “series” for months now. It’s September, Labor Day is past and the race is on. How about just the first in the series?
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Yes, admin- we need a lift. Please have at it- we are her foundation of loyal supporters, well, most of us are – I still grit my teeth when the one here defends Obama’s policies and actions as justifiable homicide..

So please don’t hesitate- we are more than ready- we need a dose of good will hunting..

A package of job-creation and economic growth proposals that President Barack Obama will put before Congress will be paid for and will not breach the legal U.S. borrowing limit, the White House said on Wednesday.

The president will deliver a major jobs speech to a joint session of Congress on Thursday.

Carney declined to confirm reports Obama would lay out a $300 billion package before lawmakers, who last month backed a $2.1 trillion increase in the U.S. debt ceiling in three steps, after agreeing to seek spending cuts of at least that amount.

Obama “will put forward, both in his speech and supporting material, a very detailed set of proposals to grow the economy and create jobs,” Carney said. “They will be specific, they will be measurable, they will be paid for,” he said.

Job creating proposals that lead to an increase in government spending could potentially lift U.S. borrowing toward the legal limit if they are large enough and not paid for fast enough by other measures to boost revenue or curb spending elsewhere.

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will ring the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange on Friday, in a remembrance of the victims of the September 11 attacks, the State Department said.

Joining her will be a who’s who of city notables on duty 10 years ago when the twin towers of the World Trade Center collapsed in the heart of New York’s financial district.

The same group was with Clinton, then a US senator for New York, when she rang the opening bell at the stock exchange on September 17, 2001, the first day of trading after the devastating attacks by Al-Qaeda militants.

Among them will be former mayor Rudolph Giuliani, the city’s police commissioner, former chiefs of the fire department and emergency management office, the former governor, and the former heads of the exchange and the Securities and Exchange Commission, the State Department said.

They will “remember the victims of 9/11, their families and loved ones, and those who aided the rescue and recovery effort,” it said.

Before the opening bell, there will be a moment of silence followed by the singing of “God Bless America” by a US Marine Corps major.

Barack Obama’s betrayal will resonate in history long after he has become just another name on the over-priced celebrity speaker circuit. It is a betrayal of far more than the youthful idealists and loyal progressives who put him in the White House. Obama has unmoored the Democratic Party from its foundations — philosophical and electoral. No longer is it an expression of the persons, programs and ideas that crystallized with the New Deal and which dominated the country’s politics for sixty years. Its future is that of ad hoc assemblage of hustlers and special interests whose sole claim to govern will be that it is not the amalgamated Tea/Republican Party. Obama, by this Oedipus-like act of patricide, has also betrayed the country that voted for an enlightened leader with a social conscience — a country in desperate need of the opposite to the fate he has laid on us.

Barack Obama was the active factor that has precipitated this tragedy. Who and what he is, therefore, is of the utmost importance. It deserves close scrutiny since his unbecoming traits of personality are not his alone, although he does represent their distilled essence — and he alone managed to become President of the United States. There are more Obamas, or Obama look-alikes, in our future. What are the most salient ingredients in his private-public persona? Most striking is a behavior pattern that resembles closely the narcissistic syndrome — even if he is not a clinical narcissist. A narcissist has no convictions other than a total dedication to his own gratification. That gives him the freedom to maneuver without inhibition or conscience with the revered self as the only reference point. All expressions of ideals, of opinions, of intentions are implicitly so qualified. A complementary narcissistic trait is an ease with blurring the line between virtual reality and actual reality. Narcissists believe everything they say — at the moment they say it. Their declarations are sterile acts that have no pride of parentage nor can they expect honor from offspring. Witness Obama’s momentarily rousing support of a labor movement that he has scorned for thirty months. This is the same President who has launched an all-out campaign against public school teachers whose unions serve as the whipping-boy for all that ails American education. Narcissists take as given that they never dissemble or lie — because to do so is to acknowledge that reality has an intolerably constraining claim on them.

Of course, this last is a feature of contemporary American political culture in general. Facts are taken to be infinitely malleable, the very notion of truth is denied, speaking honestly is viewed as a lifestyle choice, and communication is more a matter of self affirmation than an attempt to convey knowledge, emotion or intention to somebody else. We have externalized navel gazing to a remarkable degree. One consequence is that public discourse is not anchored by common standards of honesty. It is a maelstrom of opinion, emotive outbursts, mythology and primal screams. Accountability, therefore, ceases to exist. There is accountability only where there are benchmarks of veracity, a reasonably rigorous monitoring of what is said and done, and a dedication on the part of some at least to ensuring that these requirements for a viable democracy are met. The abject failure of the media to perform these functions to any reasonable degree is a hallmark of our times. The think tank and academic worlds are little better.

This amorphous environment is narcissist friendly terrain. It is permissive of twists and turns, leaves no record of what was done yesterday or the day before — much less a year ago, and focuses only on the evanescent existential moment. Case in point is the remarkably uncritical coverage that Obama has received from the supposedly responsible media — especially those who claim to be upholders of the ideas and policies and interests that he has betrayed. This aspect of the Obama saga is overlooked because of the savage, mindless attacks on him by the crackpot right which now controls the Republican Party. Their excesses were the story, the only story. The instinct to protect Obama was so powerful that it stilled the voices of those who should have been both bolstering and cajoling him to remain true to his avowed commitments. To this day, the hesitation about calling out Obama is manifest — witness the minimal reaction to his brazen reversal on clean air standards that is required by legal stipulation to promulgate. Pressuring Obama early on also would have been the line of political realism since opinion surveys have made clear that it was the Republicans who were out of step with prevailing attitudes on issue after issue. That remains true today despite the White House and the Democratic Congressional leadership jettisoning them wholesale. It cannot last for very long, of course, with the mass defections that have left American politics with only one narrative, the legitimizing of a Darwinian social philosophy, the ensconcing of moneyed interests on the throne of power, and the deference now shown the Tea Party outrages.

The vow by so many not to hold to account a President (the first person of color to occupy the White House) who engaged in one unseemly sellout after another emboldened Obama to go further and further down that road. Only now that the disaster has occurred are a few tentative, mild voices of serious criticism raised about the man, his methods and his politics. They have little practical meaning since the damage is done, the game is lost, the Democratic Party is denatured, and the great progressive wave of the 20th century that reconciled Americanism with the social ethics of the modern world reversed. Free of any mea culpas and lacking a sense of urgency, these mild chastisements fall into the ignoble category of “grandpa reassurances.” When many years from now a grandchild asks over Thanksgiving dinner: “grandpa, where were you when they ruined my country?” he can dredge up something he wrote in the late summer of 2011 to show that he was indeed a responsible person on the side of the angels.

Former New York City Mayor and 2008 Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani said he wants Bill Clinton back in office in the wake of President Barack Obama, who he called a “disaster.”

“For the last couple of years, having been a critic of President Clinton, I’ve been saying to myself, ‘I want you back. You weren’t so bad. You reformed welfare and you put 100,000 cops out on the street. You understood how to compromise with us, and this has been really a disaster,’” Giuliani said during his keynote speech at a National Press Club Luncheon.

Giuliani’s comments were made in response to a question from the moderator of the program on whether or not conservatives can win the electorate in the next presidential election, which, the moderator said, tends to “have to be won in the middle.”

Giuliani replied, “I think that this election will get determined — like most re-elections of presidents — based on our economy and the president’s performance with regard to our economy. I think his speech the next night is going to be really important. It’s his last chance to be moderate.”

“It’s his last chance to do a Bill Clinton, ” he continued, “which is what he has to do if he wants to give himself a chance to be re-elected. But if he remains tied to extremely unrealistic ideas about our economy and those unrealistic ideas are borne out by the poor performance of our economy, it doesn’t matter if somebody’s right-wing, middle-wing or no-wing, they’re going to beat him because the American people will say, ‘let’s give something else a chance. This isn’t working.”

“Right now, if the election took place,” Giuliani concluded, “I believe the president would lose to any one of the… top two or three Republicans that are running.”

President Barack Obama earned the lowest monthly job approval rating of his presidency to date in August, with 41% of U.S. adults approving of his overall job performance, down from 44% in July. He also received term-low monthly job approval ratings from both Hispanics (48%) and whites (33%) and tied his lowest rating from blacks (84%).

Wow Rudy giving WJC props must really smart in Kool Aidville. Didn’t he run for the Senate against Bill’s wife? I remember people going off the rails on the crazy train when Geraldine Ferraro said decent things about Palin. Reading the Rudy piece is just flat out delicious.

I read that yesterday about the “lifetime limit” on welfare in Michigan….well its about 10 years to late…unemployment among blacks is at an all time high…where are these folks going to work???? What they’ll do is riot, get hurt, come to hospital and just no telling what else…

The children….I them see come here…so sad for them! It’s real easy to pop off about the welfare queens but when you look into the eyes of their children, its just a little harder to pop off about it… I hope we can as a nation figure out what to do with the folks that have never held a job…I guess lock them all up, huh??? When the like of Warren Buffet pays less in Taxes than his secretary and we can’t get these people to work…its sad for this nation… I guess we can become like China…and let the peasants die, huh?

God knows Confloyd but it has to stop, its being milked and milked and you are right it is the kids that suffer but a lot of these kids are being brought into the world as benefit assets and thats not right either, in order to keep housing or benefits. There is a lot of people who live of benefits because they want to and dont want to work.

The only way to stop it, is to make that lifestyle less attractive, if the incentive to sit on your ass isnt there then it will help cure the problem.

Wisconsin woman and her son left her sister to die after she fell, going out for pizza and then concealing her death for two years, prosecutors say.

Veronica King, 71, and her son, Steven King, 45, did not summon help for Mary Coleman when she fell during a visit to King’s home in 2009, according to prosecutors. They are now charged with first-degree reckless homicide, hiding a corpse and recklessly subjecting an individual at risk to abuse.

Coleman, who was 70, lay where she fell, able to speak for days until she died from her injuries. Veronica King said when she and her son returned, she gave her sister liquids, but no food or medical care, according to the complaint. When Coleman died, neither King nor her son called to have the body removed “because we had other things to do that day,” the complaint said.

They allegedly kept Coleman’s deah a secret, hiding her first in the basement and later in the garage, until police found the remains. The pair withdrew cash and wrote checks on Coleman’s bank account, into which her Social Security and pension checks were deposited, according to police.

Wisconsin woman and her son left her sister to die after she fell, going out for pizza and then concealing her death for two years, prosecutors say.

Veronica King, 71, and her son, Steven King, 45, did not summon help for Mary Coleman when she fell during a visit to King’s home in 2009, according to prosecutors. They are now charged with first-degree reckless homicide, hiding a corpse and recklessly subjecting an individual at risk to abuse.

Coleman, who was 70, lay where she fell, able to speak for days until she died from her injuries. Veronica King said when she and her son returned, she gave her sister liquids, but no food or medical care, according to the complaint. When Coleman died, neither King nor her son called to have the body removed “because we had other things to do that day,” the complaint said.

They allegedly kept Coleman’s deah a secret, hiding her first in the basement and later in the garage, until police found the remains. The pair withdrew cash and wrote checks on Coleman’s bank account, into which her Social Security and pension checks were deposited, according to police.

“it has to stop, its being milked and milked and you are right it is the kids that suffer but a lot of these kids are being brought into the world as benefit assets and thats not right either.”

You are right, moononpluto. In Paterson, I used to overhear all kinds of conversations. During one, in the spring, when the window to my dungeon was open to the parking lot, two black women were sitting outside and one was talking about how she intended to get pregnant again to get more benefits. The other was completely supportive.

Another black teacher’s aide I became friendly with and who worked with SE kids used to tell me about all the girls she ran around with in high school whose goal was to get pregnant so they could get an apartment for themselves and their boyfriends with the help of the gov.

A Dominican women would tell me about how many women she knew who would fly to the U.S. to give birth so their kids would be citizens. She was disgusted by it.

Have I mentioned how out-of-control, rude and nasty many of the kids were? It has to stop.

confloyd/moononpluto
I think the laws vary from state to state, but I know in Suffolk County on Long Island if you are getting benefits you are working. State will provide child care but if you cannot find gainful employment then you work at the Salvation Army and you get no paycheck- just whatever food stamps and cash stipend you’re already getting. There no one is having a child just to get meager benefits. Biggest drain I have seen is outpatient drug and alcohol therapy. Crazy insane money gets poured into these facilities. Between 4 and 5 hundred dollars per day per client charged to medicaid. Treatment is almost always cheaper than incarceration but the owners of these companies are just flat out ripping the government off. One place I worked with had 80 clients they got picked up at 7 in a van had a morning AA meeting then small group therapy then NA meeting then another small group meeting. This place had three counselors for eighty patients and not one even had an associates degree. Certificates in substance abuse. They probably made under 15 an hour. Painful difficult job but I think more harm is done to our “support” system by the vultures that create a very lucrative income by feeding on the needy.

First, do no harm. Economists say the most important part of the jobs plan President Barack Obama will unveil Thursday night is the renewal of two measures already in place—a cut in Social Security taxes and emergency aid for the unemployed.

His new proposals, like spending more for transportation projects and cutting taxes for companies that hire the unemployed, probably wouldn’t add many jobs, they say. Not soon, anyway.

The job market needs big help. In August, the economy generated zero job growth. And the unemployment rate is 9.1 percent, a level more typical for a recession than for a recovery in its third year.

For Obama, who also faces sinking approval ratings as he goes before a joint session of Congress and on national TV, the options are limited. Congress must approve any new measures, and congressional Republicans oppose new spending.

Read the whole thing here. Lately, most things estimated by economists have been revised downward later on. So, if the trend applies here, Obama’s plan would probably decrease jobs.

Well one thing we could do about the child problem is quit having so many children…e.i the conservatives will never allow that…so we bore them and then starve them or send them to prison…Geez…I guess that’s a life but in the end it still costs for these prisons..

Everyday I see walk thru the doors…children who look so malnourished/dirty/uncared for..it is simply amazing….yet we as a nation are calling these people welfare queens…you know they don’t have to be…what about taking these kids for their drug/alcohol addicted parents and put them in an orphanage…some kids in these types of facities learn real life skills…

I don’t know the answer…but all I’m saying as it is as hard to look at these kids as well as the starving children of Africa/Afganistan and others….just a personal experience.

We need great minds to think what to do about this…if Bill and Hillary can help the starving children of Africa they can help these kids, but we have to unhinder them from the like of Karol Rove, Rush, Glenn, the idiots on NBC and the rest of the yocals…

henry,
I agree…I saw today where they got a bunch for medicare fraud…we need to keep going with that kind of management of our money….I think most people want the money for the children…but are sick of paying for payola’s and such….

I think its too much unless he thinks there is more there. Not really necessary unless the system is chronic, could well be an age thing though but generally thats way too much, unless there is cancerous cells or a systemic failure, why the hell does he need every 3 months.

Medication ought to keep it in check. Not to mention the amount of drugs before and during a colonoscopy is dangerous the older you get. The clean out drugs and the others as well.

American cancer society recommends a check when over 50 of every 5 – 10 years and you should not be having a colonoscopy during active bouts of crohns or UC as it can tear the bowel.

Be careful the doctor just doesnt want to make money.

Last time i had a colonoscopy, i was awake during the whole thing and they gave me these drugs that make you forget about it afterwards, now thats my kind of hospital drugs.

Basil99
You are probably right I know nada about NJ rules. I just think there is probably a better way of doing it all and that does not mean throwing money at a situation. I was so frustrated once with New york because they brought in a guy who had lived for years in the subway tunnels. his skin was stained from soot and the paramedics took him to Bellvue to detox and he hit the fucking lottery because instead of being sent to a generic rehab he got a county bed at a private facility. he smelled so bad that he even got a private room as no one could be around him. At first they thought he stank due to organ failure but after two weeks his enzymes were normal and he still reeked. I am not a doctor and have zero medical training outside of watching every episode of Quincy(just because I really really really want to live on a boat) but I eventually solved the mystery. It was his feet. Nothing Clorex couldn’t cure. I learned a lot of stuff from this guy. Did you know that you can get a weeks worth of penicillin for about a dollar if you buy fish food. Anyhow he spends 28 days in rehab after being collected from a bench. He spends weeks being pumped full of benzos and then he is pretty much deposited back on the street. So messed up. Do gooders can kiss my ass. He cannot go back to where he was and there is zip for him to do.

I think lots of people need a hand here and there. It just has to be responsible.— Humanely and economically.

I’m sure I sound barbaric but I honestly think that if you have to get a license to drive a car you should have to get a license to have kids.

I know that’s an impossible dream but at least in this country where pregnancy is easily preventable there has to be a deterrent of some kind.

I once started a sci-fi short story about all newborns being equipped with a microchip which prevented pregnancy until, at a certain age, they could prove they were competent to have and raise children. Then the chip would be removed.

I know, I know, the big brother thing made it an impossible story to write and population control efforts result in nations like China which because of gender preference now have something like 116 males for every female.

There is no easy answer but d@mn it I am sick of those who use and abuse the rest of us.

“That is what public virtue amounts to in today’s America in the wake of the great Obama betrayal.”
________________________

The public allowed this to happen. They made no effort to vet Obama. They allowed themselves to be dumbed down by his supporters and went along just to get along. They believed every word out of his mouth and his promises without consideration of what was staring them in the face-
NO RECORD of Achievement WHATSOEVER! It’s just too BAD we all had to suffer along with them to prove a point.

However, I shudder to think how vile Obama and his supporters would have been towards Hillary and us, had she taken the election away from him by some miraculous event. I guess when we think how bad off we are, we’ll never know how much worse off we might have been had Hillary prevailed in the end as president. And Obama and his minions destroyed the country anyway. Hillary did the right thing taking the SOS cabinet position. She overshadowed Obama her first month as Secretary of State never out of the public eye.

I kept this graphic hoping it would soon be our reality when Obama is cast out of her shadow-